Fourteenth Annual Eccles Organ Festival Announces Slate of Performers

SALT LAKE CITY— The Eccles Organ Festival marks its fourteenth anniversary season with a slate of outstanding performers.

The Festival, which is the largest annual organ event with guest recitalists in the Intermountain West, is made possible by a generous grant from the George S. and Dolores Doré Eccles Foundation.

The Organ Festival is comprised of five concerts presented by distinguished international, national, and local recitalists.

This year’s international performers are Jan Bokszczanin, from Legionowo, Poland, and Olivier Vernet from Monaco.

Mr. Bokszczanin is a lecturer at the Music Academy in £ódz and has been the Artistic Director of the Legionowo Chamber and Organ Music Festival since 2004. He is also the author of the book entitled "Genesis and Traditions of the Russian Organ Music," published in November 2001.

Mr. Vernet is currently Titular Organist of the Monaco Cathedral after his selection in an international competition for the post. He is also Professor of Organ at the Tour Conservatory in France, and in Monaco at the Academy of Music Rainier III. He is artistic Director of the Monaco International Organ Festival and the Organ Festival of Mougins. He was unanimously awarded First Prize at the U.F.A.M. International competition in Paris in 1984, and in 1991 was the First Prize winner at the International Organ Competition in Bordeaux.

Additionally, the Festival has engaged three talented American organists to perform: Dong-ill Shin, Organist/ Music Associate at First United Methodist Church in Hurst, Texas, and organ teacher at Texas Wesleyan University; Maxine Thévenot, Associate Organist/Choir Director at the Cathedral Church of St. John in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Heidi Alley, organist for St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Salt Lake City.

Shin completed his Artist Diploma Degree at the Boston Conservatory on a full scholarship studying with James David Christie. He is the 2006 Grand Prize winner of France’s Chartres International Organ Competition.

Thévenot has received the Bachelor of Music in Music Education with distinction from the University of Saskatchewan, and the degrees, Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts in organ performance from the Manhattan School of Music, New York, where she was twice awarded the Bronson Ragan Award for ‘most outstanding organist.’

She is also a published photographer in issues of The Organ and Choir and Organ magazines.

Alley graduated from Brigham Young University in organ performance studying with Dr. Parley Belnap. She has served for many years as a faculty member of the Church Music Workshop at Brigham Young University and is a popular performer and accompanist at local venues in Salt Lake City including the Assembly Hall, Zion’s Lutheran Church, and the Cathedral of the Madeleine.

SALT LAKE CITY — Dong-Ill Shin, Organist/Music Associate at First United Methodist Church in Hurst, Texas and organ teacher at Texas Wesleyan University, will perform the first recital of the Fourteenth Annual Eccles Organ Festival on Sunday, September 9, at 8:00 pm, in the Cathedral of the Madeleine, Salt Lake City, Utah.

Shin studied in France with Jean Boyer and received the Diplóme National Superieur de Musique from the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique de Lyon in Organ, Harmony, Fugue, Analysis, Improvisation & Basso-Continuo.

During his years of study in France he won several scholarships including awards from the Darazzi Foundation, the Meyer Foundation and Société Générale. In 2004 he completed his Artist Diploma Degree at the Boston Conservatory on a full scholarship studying with James David Christie.

In addition to winning the prestigious Chartres Competition last year, Shin is a prize winner of international competitions such as Musashino-Tokyo International Organ Competition in 1996, Ciurlionis International Piano and Organ Competition, Lithuania, and the 51th Prague Spring International Music Festival and Competition in 1999, the 21st St. Albans, Great Britain in 2001, and the National Young Artists Competition in Organ Performance of the AGO in 2004.

The program will consist of music by J.S. Bach, César Franck, Louis Vierne, Maurice Duruflé and Henry Purcell. As with all cultural events in the Cathedral of the Madeleine, this concert is open to the public and free of charge.